


Longmire: Pila Song

by AJGhostWolf



Category: Longmire (TV), Walt Longmire Mysteries - Craig Johnson
Genre: Case Fic, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-13
Updated: 2021-02-06
Packaged: 2021-03-17 16:42:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28728309
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AJGhostWolf/pseuds/AJGhostWolf
Summary: A mesh of book and TV Longmire is on the prowl for a killer and rapist haunting Absaroka County, doing his best to keep his own spooks at bay and his skeletons in the closet while keeping DCI out of his territory and trying to track down the killer. But a man can only do so much, and even with the ‘Big Medicine’ the Cheyenne have levied upon him, Walt is finding himself uncharacteristically out of his depth. But ever since the Vietnam war he’s swam with sharks, and he’ll be damned if a little bit of deep water will stop him now.
Relationships: Walt Longmire/Victoria "Vic" Moretti
Kudos: 3





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Well y’all know me, I have five or six open fics I need to finish and I just start a new one, giving the one-finger salute all the while.   
>  Anyway, for those unaware, the Netflix Longmire series was inspired by books written by a man named Craig Johnson, and they are very, very good. For those able I really recommend buying them, ThriftBooks is a great online site I’ve used. They really are so good I think everyone can find something in them to love, and I especially love the nuance. And while, in usual fashion, the TV series doesn’t do the books justice, it does stand up in its own right and make a great show, and Robert Taylor does a great job in the role. I like both the books and show, so I’ve merged them to write this piece, which I hope you enjoy.   
>  I include a lot of references to the books, because I love them very much and am reading them right now, but I’ll do my best to explain them in a way that feels natural.   
>  Anyhow, sorry for the wall of Nobody-Cares-Text, but figured I’d better put it in. Hope you enjoy it and leave your thoughts on how I’m doing, happy reading!

Pila Song

I looked down at the half-froze sludge of dirty water and body and wearily wondered just what in the hell had possessed me to get into law enforcement. It sure wasn’t as prone to glitter and glamour as being an airline pilot or something. 

“This pulpy bastard’s cost me the price of filters,” Elgin Mathers, the mush-mouthed farmer who owned this piece of country and the water tower, fumed. “Not to mention if any of my cows take sick.” 

I didn’t bother to comment on that, hell if I even knew what I could’ve said, just crouched down and resisted the urge to poke the collapsed bag of jelly flesh and throw up at the same time. 

‘Pulpy’ was about the right word, Elgin was poking the blob with a stick and every time it touched the skin the whole things oozed and quivered. I couldn’t tell if the person had been male or female, right now they were pretty much just soup. Slushy, mossy, disgusting soup. 

“You missing anyone, Walt?” Elgin asked me between pokes. 

I watched a stream of water start as the stick easily broke through what could be called skin in some circles and the body seemed to wheeze further in on itself, draining. After the bloat had kind of decreased, we could both see the pulsing of millions of maggots under the cloudy skin. 

“Don’t know,” I said, pretty tonelessly. I was disgusted, but this wasn’t quite on my top five worst things yet. Vietnam still held four of those for me. The Rez held the other. “Haven’t been in the office yet.” 

Elgin grunted and threw his poking stick, now substantially more gooey and maggot-y, off into the sagebrush. “They gonna make you bag this . . . .” he seemed lost for words as he threw a hand at the scene. “Mess.” 

I wasn’t in the mood to laugh, but tried a grunt on for size. “They can try.” I stood up and made to walk back to my old Bronco. There was hot coffee in there, which I desperately wanted. “I don’t get paid enough.” 

He made a face that I found myself agreeing with on a spiritual level. “No, I bet they don’t. You’d have to use a garbage bag and a spoon!” 

He laughed as I gagged and I laughed when he tripped and fell down from laughing. 

* * * * *

The first thing I did when I finally got back to the office was to use the shower. I’d been dry camping for the past two weeks and was well onto aromatic, since I’d been called to the scene before I could go back to my cabin. Even Elgin, who was not known for his self care routine, had commented on my ripeness. 

As I dried off I looked in the mirror a moment, dripping wet. Scars and lines, sun spots, a deep tan that made me look the consistency of leather. Not far from the truth, if you asked a few of my doctors. One shriveled up ear, not helping to dispute the leather analogy at all. And some of the coldest eyes I’d ever seen. A mean, killing cold. I sure wasn’t good looking in any sense of the word, my nose was a few times broke and I just looked plain damn mean. Always had. 

My old boss called me things like ‘Cussedness’ and ‘P.O.’d’ between doing slightly less than legal things of his own. Regular old comedian, he was. ‘That big cold-eyed bastard’ was one of his favorites, because it hit all the major points. People who hadn’t met me before seemed to be able to put me to the description, at least. 

Most just called me scary and intimidating. Including my Deputies and other county’s Sheriffs. Didn’t bother me a goddamn bit. It had made all the difference between the stupid things people tried to pull on me. Guns and knives withstanding. 

I just figured that I was born pissed off and had been losing ground ever since. 

I shook myself from that and finished up, redressing out of my range bag where I kept a couple clean changes of clothes. Mud and gore were anything but lacking in this profession. 

With blue jeans and a white t-shirt on my still-damp self, I stuffed my old clothes back into the bag, loaded all my accessories into my pockets and strapped on my knife and gun. Right side, in that order, between belt loops. 

I was still warm from the shower so didn’t bother putting on my sweatshirt or jacket, and Ruby kept the office a cool ninety degrees on these winter days. Even my hat felt too warm. 

My old boss, Lucian Connelly, the ancient one-legged reprobate, was standing near my receptionist’s desk when I got there. I set my bag down and hung my outer-wear on the coat rack and raised an eyebrow at him. 

The former Sheriff handed me a cup of the Ferg’s murky coffee and asked, “How was vacation?” 

He sounded like his favorite hobby was competitively chugging glass and gravel. Who knows, back in the forties and fifties, between ‘the Indians and the Basquos and my sorry ass,’ as he’d say, it might have been. 

“Fine.” I set the cup down, the Ferg really couldn’t make a cup of coffee worth a damn, and found the Reports binder on Ruby’s desk. 

Only a couple of new ones had been added in the weeks I’d been gone, pretty typical for our little piece of territory. A pull over for an expired license and a wellness check on old man Weatherby. Still alive for now. We’d probably be out again in another four or five months to make sure again. 

“Fill your tags?” Ferg, the head of Search and Rescue and an avid fisherman, walked out into the office. He was always one for conversation. 

“Yep.” We’d been checking in on Weatherby for years, and probably would be for many more. He was a tough old bird with more lives than Jesus himself. 

Ferg shifted impatiently. He had always had trouble with how hard it was to persuade small talk out of me. “What’d you bag?” 

“Trout.” I replaced the Reports binder and located the laptop they’d given us a few months back. No raises this year but laptops for everyone. Go figure. Our most recent arrest was for traffic violation and subsequent assault on arresting officers before fleeing into our county and wrecking. Thrilling. She was in our custody awaiting trial as of two days ago. In other words, she had decked one of my people in the nose and got to Ride the Pavement. 

Ferg was growing exasperated, which I took my own amusement in, and sputtered for a second before retreating back to the cells. 

Lucian laughed. 

I looked over across an office plant at the person beyond Lucian and the Ferg. “Vic, the paramedics got there before I left, they said they’d need help scooping and bagging and to send someone small enough to climb into that water tower to scrape up the juices.” 

She glared at me and pretended to stick a finger down her throat and gag. “Fuck that, and you if you think you can make me!” 

I just smiled and took the report I’d written before leaving Elgin’s place from my bag to put in the Reports binder. I offered it to Lucian, who declined in favor of his terrible coffee and staring out the window at the ugly sky and grey territory. Wryly, “I just had lunch, thanks.” He craned his neck to peer closer at the grey above and commented, “Gonna spit some snow.” 

I gave the sky a cursory glance, nodded once, and returned to my paperwork. I’d have to type it up on the new laptop and make sure it was filed for record. Attaching the pictures would be the best part, grey goop surrounded by equally grey countryside. Welcome to Wyoming, you should have gone to Florida if you wanted sunshine and nice things. 

And there was still the matter of combing missing person’s files, logging the approximate height, weight, age, gender, and what all determiners were left to try for a match. I wasn’t very optimistic about identifying the body. The world is a big goddamn place, and a lot of people just disappear without ever being found. Our new and very wiggly friend was probably going to be one of them. Our M.E., Isaac Bloomfield, was not going to be thrilled with this. Neither was Vic, who I was probably going to assign to this. Saizarbitoria, ‘Sancho,’ was already on the woman who was currently enjoying our hospitality before court sentencing. There was nothing to help Vic, but I could go talk to Isaac myself today, with some of the Busy Bee’s wares to make up for it. 

Of course, it was hard to get the man down. He had been one of three survivors of a Nazi concentration camp, nearly beaten and starved to death, surrounded by hundreds who had died of just that. He still carried the ghostly inkings on the inside of his arm, prisoner ID number. No, he had every reason to be content with his lot in life. 

I looked at Lucian, who had settled into the receptionist’s chair with my big dog’s head in his lap. “Where’s Ruby?” She had been watching Dog while I was gone, and yet. 

“With Ladies Wear.” The Bear, still wooing every woman in my life. Typical story. His eyes squinted as he added meaningfully, “His niece is back in town.” 

Shit. 


	2. Chapter 2

It was snowing. Lucian and Dog and I were sitting in Lucian’s room in the Durant Home for Assisted Living, watching the snow fall from a probably eighty degree room. I’d had to shed most of my layers and was back to a t-shirt, sans hat. 

Lucian moved a Knight on the board, capturing one of my Rooks and putting my Queen in danger. I moved the Queen and he took my now-exposed Bishop, cackling. 

Every Wednesday I played chess with the man, and every Wednesday I got my ass whipped. 

“You talk to Isaac about the feller with the goddamn indecency to die in the middle of winter?” 

Lucian had such a way with words. 

“Not yet.” I leaned back in my chair and watched as Lucian completed the corner on my King. 

“Check.” 

I sighed and started resetting the board. “Did you see Melissa?” 

“Yep.” Coal black eyes met mine but he didn’t say anything, choosing to slowly tamp tobacco into his pipe instead. “You wanna sit on the porch?” 

A look outside at the vortex of snow made me think that no, I didn’t, but I followed as he levered his scrawny frame from his chair and hobbled that direction. He threw my coat at me and put his on, his face suddenly looking like smoking his pipe wasn’t worth going into the cold maelstrom outside. And it was cold outside the sliding glass door, with a bite in the wind that made me glad to have finally gotten my stove in and that I’d left wood on the porch a few weeks ago, before I left. Hopefully the whole place wasn’t in ashes. As it was, getting home was going to be slick with ice and I didn’t want to find something that depressing when I finally got there. 

Lucian sent a murderous expression at the snow-covered plastic deck chairs and leaned against the wall instead, lighting his pipe and puffing on it while I kicked snow away from the door. It was pretty fruitless, it was falling hard enough that in less than an hour it would be right back. I wondered how much we were going to get, and when it would stop. The Bear would know. He always knew. 

We stood in silence for many more minutes than I wanted to before he had gotten enough smoke in him to open up. 

“She’s lookin’ good, considerin’.” His face writhed in disdain. “Better than she’s had any chance to be.” 

Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. Rape.  Her rapists only getting a few years of serving in a youth facility. 

Three out of four were now dead, but that was little consolation for any of us. Especially the Cheyenne. 

Melissa didn’t know better, now or then. I still couldn’t decide whether or not that was a bad thing. 

Lucian stared up into the sky with an unreadable expression, until the wet flakes started landing on his nose and then he shook his head. Not only from the snow, I figured. 

“I would’a killed those little punk bastards if I was still Sheriff,” he said almost softly. 

I grunted, because I know he would’ve. I know he would’ve when it happened if I’d let him. Vonnie beat him, and all of us, to it. 

“Ladies Wear would’ve, too.” His old face wrinkled from one inscrutable expression into another. “Any of us would’ve. But this time we live in . . . .” He let it hang and just shook his head. 

He was still mad at me, then. So were the Cheyenne, and my best friend the Bear. For not doing just that, taking them out to the Powder River and burying them for good. Or at least making them serve longer sentences. Sometimes I was mad at myself, too. But that was not something under my control. 

I was of the mind that the American Indian was the most oppressed race of the last thirty years, and still was. No one cares about them, when their children are raped or murdered. It was the reason the Bear had tried to get into politics before and after Vietnam, with a Native American studies degree in hand and a reasonable idea in his head. He’d lost his patience with politics real quick, when nothing changed. 

But again, that was not something under my control. 

I sighed deeply and walked back inside. It was too goddamn cold outside. 

Dog stared at me from the couch and I wished my life could be as simple as his. 

It took Dog and I an hour to get home over shitty roads, and after being cling-wrapped in my 360-degree curtained shower, I was dead tired. I didn’t even dream and it seemed way too soon before my phone was ringing in the living room. I glared at my watch, 04:13 in the A.M., before stumbling into the living room. 

I snatched up the phone probably harder than I needed to and snapped, “What?!” 

“Well good-fucking-morning to you too,” Vic’s voice said, fading slightly into static every few seconds. “I’m out on the Powder, freezing my ass off, with a wreck.” 

“What do you need my help for? I like my ass the way it is, thanks.” I started getting my coffee ready anyway. 

“Because you’re the fucking Sheriff, asshole.” She was smiling too, I could hear it. It dropped as she added, “One of the dipshits is demanding to talk to you.” 

“Why?” 

“What am I, Houdini? I don’t fucking know. But he won’t leave me alone, so you need to come out here.” 

I sighed and felt like just going back to bed. I figured I’d be feeling like that for all of the foreseeable future. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello guys! Hope you enjoy this chapter, she's a little short but hopefully still a decent read. If you're wanting/needing any clarification on anything be sure to let me know and I'll get back to you with a (hopefully) good explanation, since things in the books are pretty different than the TV series. Anyway, all disclaimers out of the way, leave your thoughts and enjoy!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, let me know if you need anything clarified and leave your thoughts! Happy reading, folks!

The voices of Don Edwards, Ian Tyson, and Dave Stamey filtered through the Bronco’s speakers as I cut my way through the dark, heading for the mile marker Vic had given me along the Powder. She must have been the only one in the office, watching our wayward tenant as the only female officer, and picked up the call. She didn’t tell me who she’d called in to man (or, I guess, woman) the office while she responded, but I was guessing it was Ruby or Ruby’s granddaughter, Janine. Totally legal? No. The only option we had sometimes? Absolutely. 

Dog laid his big five-gallon head on my knee and groaned in, I’m assuming, boredom. I’d stopped in at the Kum-and-Go, a name which never failed to make the twelve-year-old in me snicker, and gotten a couple bags of jerky and pepperoni sticks; and most egregiously, I hadn’t shared anything with him. I’d also grabbed a RedBull and a candy bar for Vic, seeing as she was probably tired and pissed. Which was normal, but still, I tried. 

It took us—well, mostly me—an hour and a half to get to the wreck site, and it wasn’t a pretty picture. A little green Subaru had twisted itself over, under, and around an old Ford pickup, which was also twisted about twelve ways from Sunday. EMS had arrived, probably half an hour back based on their progress with an old cowboy sitting on the back of their unit. The advantages of not stopping at a poorly staffed K-and-G at five in the morning. The guy looked worse for wear but obviously only injured enough to warrant roadside service. 

Vic was sitting in her little unit car, behind all the action, half-asleep, being talked at by a guy in the back of her car. She’d described him as “A hatfull of drunk, arguing assholes.” Her and Lucian had really cornered the market on peculiarly vulgar phrasing. 

When I pulled in across the road and unassed from the Bronco, she stepped out and slammed her door, hard. “You better have brought me some fucking coffee.” 

“One better.” I forked over the big energy drink and candy like I was handing it to a hungry hyena, a pretty similar comparison except that Vic wasn’t laughing. At all. 

She snarled through a wad of chocolate and RedBull, “That motherfucker’s the one who wants to talk to you.” 

I clocked the more than usual anger on her face and nodded. “He’s being an ass.” 

“And then some.” She paused a moment to chomp some more. “If you took any longer I was going to shoot him.” 

I didn’t have to take a quick glance to make sure she wasn’t kidding, I knew she both was and wasn’t. “He’s being contrary?” 

“Apparently he’s a ‘Sovereign Citizen,’ fuck-ever that means.” She practically chugged the RedBull. I practically gagged just from the smell of the vile stuff. “No license, insurance, registration, anything. Demanded to speak with you right here. I was all too happy to oblige, he’s a regular wing-nut.” 

“He escape from an asylum?” She didn’t laugh so I stopped trying to be funny. My head hurt too much, anyway. “Dog probably wants company, you should keep my heaters warm.” 

She scoffed but meandered that way, and I opened the back of her unit to talk with her new friend. He drew back sharply from the cold, his face screwed up into a sour expression as he regarded me. He wasn’t all that impressed, but neither was I so we were pretty even. 

He had some significant chub and a neck-beard with all his probably six-one glory, and the smell of old B.O. completed the ensemble nicely. His hair and half-beard were greasy and unkempt, and I made the mental note to have Vic check her car for lice and fleas later. All around, a pretty flattering image, and he obviously thought he was hot-shit too when he opened his mouth. Immediately my head hurt more. 

“Are you the Sheriff?” The sneer could be heard a mile away through his nasal pitch. 

“Yep, Sheriff Longmire of Absaroka County.” 

His very blank look pretty obviously showed he had no idea what I was talking about, but he boldly blazed on, as I’m sure he did often. “Your bitch of a Deputy assaulted and detained me for no reason!” 

I felt the bristle and know he saw it, but even though whatever small part of his brain was screaming at him to abort mission, he kept going. Awful brave of a handcuffed and sitting man to start shit with a six and a half foot two-seventy-some pound Vietnam veteran and Sheriff. Awful brave. Awful stupid. 

“I’m gonna sue you for every fucking cent you have, especially that bitch that works for you—” 

I’m not totally sure if it was the look in my eyes or the very big Henry Standing Bear’s sudden presence behind me that made him stop speaking, but I know my headache got a lot better when he did. I looked over my shoulder to acknowledge the Cheyenne Nation before returning attention to the Sovereign Citizen. 

“Why were you driving without a license or registration for that vehicle?” 

He regarded us both with disdain. “I ain’t no slave to the government. I know my rights, and you ain’t got shit on me. I’m traveling, you can’t charge me with shit.” 

I’m sure my face was many things in the moment, confusion first. I just shook my head and shut the door on our blathering pal before my head ran off into the fields without me. The Bear and I walked back to the Bronco, and I dug into my range bag to get to my dwindling supply of Kimberly dried cinnamon apples, which a friend from Eastern Oregon sent over occasionally. The things were like drugs, and I’d gotten most of my office hooked on the stuff. Thomas Orchards the bag said. If I was ever in Oregon, for whatever reason, I was going to buy out their season’s earnings. I had the suspicion Ruby had sent them an email directly and worked something out, because she always had a couple bags. 

As I worked on a mouthful of jerky and dried apple and coffee, Vic looked hard at Henry. “The fuck are you doing here?” 

He shrugged, a move he’d long perfected. “Dena has a police scanner.” 

Vic gave her wolfish grin, showing off the oversize canine. “Oolala, Dena hmm?” 

The Bear’s unreadable features didn’t change as he ignored my undersheriff and looked over at me. “When you are done stuffing your mouth, I’ll tell you something you might like to hear.” 

“You’re just jealous that I won’t share.” 

“The thought did occur to me.” 

I handed over the jerky and apples and poured some coffee into a tin cup from my bag. 

“What’s so God-awful important, then?” 

“Lonnie Little Bird is in the hospital.” 

I almost choked on my coffee. “When?”

“Last night.” He continued to sip my coffee, looking unperturbed. 

“And you didn’t call me?” 

“It was closer to this morning.” His dark eyes were taking around the surrounding countryside. “Melissa is alright.” 

“Good.” I dropped my apples into my bag. I’d lost my appetite. “What happened?” 

“He is not saying.” He looked up at the sky, the faint splash of orange in the east glinting metallically off his eyes. Softly, “I think he has seen his spirit.” 

I met his eyes seriously as Vic looked back and forth between us, not following. “Did it see him?” 

He shook his head. “As I said, he is not saying.” 

Shit. 


	4. Chapter 4

“Uhm hm, yes it is so.” 

The hospital smelled even more like plastic and antiseptic than usual today. The water tasted worse, and the glaring white bit at my head harder. 

“What happened, Lonnie?” 

He smiled brightly at me from the hospital bed, his show-me-your-ass gown loose around his neck where he’d been pulling at it for the past five minutes. Neither of us liked hospitals all that much. “Hey-ho, Sheriff, how are you?” 

I don’t remember telling my head to shake but it did anyway. Have to put that thing on a leash. “Fine. Lonnie, what happened?” 

“I am fine as well.” His grin got bigger and looked out of place amidst the clinical coolness of the room. Story of his people’s life. “What is up?” 

My head just shook again. “Isaac said you have a concussion.” I wasn’t disinclined to believe him about that right now. “Lonnie, Melissa said you fell?” 

His dark eyes tracked around the room like I wasn’t even there. They stopped at the far corner and stayed there with chilling intensity. “They are here, you know. You see them too.” 

Shivers ran up my spine. I knew damn well, but I asked anyway. Glutton for punishment. “Who, Lonnie?” 

“The Old Ones.” His teeth, whom I had a front row to, were white and even and conflicted with the seriousness of his eyes. “They follow you. You have big medicine.” 

I wanted to sigh, laugh, and maybe cry, but mostly I wanted to quit this one-sided conversation and get some sleep. I decided I wasn’t making any progress. “Why is that?” 

His eyes shifted to me for a moment and then went straight back to the corner, and he cocked his head slightly like he was listening to something. “They say you are more Indian than most Indians. Uhm hm, yes it is so.” 

I chewed on that for a second, not really sure what to say. I finally settled for, “Not more than you or Henry.” 

His smile saddened slightly, but he kept his eyes trained off into the corner. I snuck a glance, but I didn’t see whatever he did. 

His voice physically startled me. “It is an owl, that follows you.” 

I stared at him again. “What?” 

“An owl.” He blinked at the corner. “She follows you.” 

“The sign of death.” Boy howdy. “Why’s that?” Couldn’t hurt to ask again. 

He almost laughed. “Because wherever you go, people die. You are a lawman, uhm hm, yes it is so.” 

Hurray, the same kind of conversation I’d had with Henry and Virgil White Buffalo. It was always a fun topic. Read: not at all a fun topic. 

I just sighed and shook my head again. Maybe if I kept doing it I could turn into Woody Woodpecker and drill my way through the wall. Here’s hoping. 

“How’d you get a concussion, Lonnie?” 

He waved a hand dismissively, like it was the most uninteresting topic in the world. “I fell.” 

The  _ dumbass _ that capped off that sentence went unsaid, but I heard it and it made me smile. “Why’d you fall?” 

He looked at me and I sensed that the trace had broken. “Hey-ho, Sheriff. How are you?” 

My smile faded into something closer to a grimace. “Good, Lonnie, I’m good.” I did not feel good. 

* * * * *

“Is his mind going or . . . .” I let the thought hang and looked across the cab at Henry. I was holding the dash with one hand with the intensity to crack the vinyl if the green shitbox wasn’t so opposed to letting me. As it was the suspension, or lack thereof, was doing its best to beat us to death with the cab ceiling and spring-les bench seat. 

The Bear didn’t respond or react, his body seemingly frozen in only the way his people could achieve. If it weren’t for the scenery going by at mach ten, it wouldn’t be hard to imagine we had froze in time completely. 

“I do not think his mind is going.” 

I nodded and looked back out the windshield, hand tightening as we hit a particularly bad section of Rez road. Slightly worse than normal, anyway. I listened at metal screeched and and rattled and banged together. “The truck’s gonna fall apart around us at this rate.” 

“She will not.” He looked offended on behalf of his shitty truck. “You always hurt Rez-Dawg’s feelings when you ride with me.” 

“A habit I’m just itching to break.” Lonnie’s house was just off to the side, and we pulled into his yard with a grunt and a wheeze as the engine gave up. “Wow, she didn’t strand us ten miles down the road? What an improvement.” 

We unassed from the dented pickup and Henry popped the hood. “You are still hurting her feelings. You should apologize, or she will not start again.” 

“Absolutely not.” I looked around for a moment, just taking in what little there was to take. “You’d think Lola would have been down here.” 

“Did you see the skid marks on the road?” He hissed slightly as something burned his hand, but continued like nothing happened, “She was here, you just want to see her again.” 

I just nodded, thinking about the intense woman that had taken the Reservation Police by force and gale. She’d taken some getting used to, by everyone. But damned if she couldn’t be a fine LEO, one day. It was good she’d been here, Lonnie was only the Chief, and whether he liked it or not, kind of a big deal. 

I decided I’d sucked up all the scenery I could and stepped for Lonnie’s house. “Ten bucks says his door’s unlocked.” 

Henry appeared beside me like he’d been magicked there. “Alright.” 

So of course, when I grabbed the door knob, it didn’t move. I looked up at the Cheyenne Nation. “I don’t have ten bucks.” 

He shrugged. “That is alright, we Indians are used to you whites breaking deals.” We both smiled and he reached up to the top of the door frame, sliding his fingers around until he found a dusty key. He let us in and dryly said, “Well at least Lola locked the door.” 

I could’ve laughed but felt too sick. Two windows on the far side of the house were broken, with glass and shards of cups and plates all over the floor. Lonnie’s coveted lone bottle of Rainier had been smashed against the wall, leaving a sad trail of booze and broken glass down the paint. 

“What the hell happened here?” I don’t know who I was asking, but I was asking. 

Henry picked his way through the living room into the kitchen and then into Lonnie’s bedroom before coming back out to stand in the doorway with me. “It is all in disarray.” 

I had to clear my throat to speak. “So obviously we’re thinking home invasion. But what were they looking for?” I made another attempt at becoming the great Woodpecker. “What does Lonnie have worth . . . . this?” 

“I do not know.” 

“Yeah, and neither does Lonnie.” I pointed at one of the windowsills. “That’s why.” The blood stain covered the sill and had made a too big puddle in the carpet underneath, trailing down the wall like the beer had. It was going to be harder to clean up, and the thought made my stomach clench. I could feel the familiar stillness of rage building inside me, and inside Henry too. I’d developed a pretty good sense of that feeling in him since he’d broke my nose in grade school, and I wouldn’t want to be on the receiving end of what was building in him. Lonnie was his friend and family. Lonnie was hurt. And someone was going to pay. 

**Author's Note:**

> Pila Song is a song by Max Stalling that I enjoy and inspired the events of this first chapter.


End file.
